


our strings are snapping

by jayeinacross



Category: Marvel (Movies), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-27
Updated: 2012-08-27
Packaged: 2017-11-13 00:00:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/497132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jayeinacross/pseuds/jayeinacross
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve has somehow found himself at the centre of this strange web. There had been so much conflict at first, relentless fights and arguments, but Loki had inadvertently brought them all together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	our strings are snapping

**Author's Note:**

> For my angst bingo prompt 'shutting down'.

Steve has somehow found himself at the centre of this strange web. There had been so much conflict at first, relentless fights and arguments, but Loki had inadvertently brought them all together.

Every day, Steve can see the strings that connect them all growing brighter and clearer. There is something that binds every single Avenger together, draws them closer to each other and strengthens their bonds.

They are an unlikely group, and there were many tensions at first, but every person has strings to the others. Clint says that Bruce and Tony have bonded over science, and now when he watches Bruce and Tony together in Bruce’s lab, he understands that too. It’s mesmerizing. They’re in sync, bouncing ideas off each other and calling out equations and formulae, typing rapidly on their keyboards and throwing tools to each other, with the occasional calculation thrown in by JARVIS.

Steve likens it to how Natasha and Coulson have bonded over mutual frustration but affection nonetheless for Clint. That makes Steve laugh. He understands that, because Natasha and Coulson will sit together and eat lunch and complain about whatever Clint has done now to annoy them, but Steve can see the smiles in their eyes and hear the fondness in their voices.

After that, Steve starts seeing other things too. Natasha and Clint had already been close, and they play their own version of hide and seek in the tower (JARVIS is not allowed to help) and playing pranks on Tony and Thor. Tony and Clint drink and play darts, though Steve’s not sure why, since it always ends with Tony cursing and slurring at Clint – Clint’s aim is always perfect, no matter how much they drink, but Tony gets steadily worse and worse. Bruce and Natasha have made it their mission to make the best blend of tea that they can; they sit together in the kitchen and sample their attempts, Bruce making notes as they taste it. Thor and Coulson sit together and swap stories about their respective hometowns, little details that are alien to one another, like building model planes and strange creatures that roam around Asgard at dusk and dawn.

Steve spars with Thor and talks with Bruce about their favourite books. He sits with Tony in the shop and drinks Dummy’s smoothies and talks with JARVIS, tells Coulson about the old days with Bucky and the others. He draws Natasha as she does handstands and somersaults in the gym effortlessly, sits down with Clint where they watch movies with effects that Tony insists should be illegal, they’re so bad, but are a huge improvement on the pictures in Steve’s time.

He is their leader; the first Avenger. They all gravitate around Steve in a fight, look towards him for their orders. They are the most loyal of soldiers, and some of the best friends that Steve has ever had, could ever wish to have. They’re all protective of each other, but Steve is their leader.

And they all fall apart without him.

When they lose him, they only have one thing on their minds. Loki has proved that hate and revenge only lead to destruction, but they don’t care. They know that Steve wouldn’t want them to pursue vengeance so single-mindedly, but Steve would have done the same for any of them.

They have their orders. Fury tells them to return to SHIELD, where they will discuss what further action to take, but they don’t answer to Fury. They have no one to take orders from anymore. Their Captain is dead.

Once the man who killed Steve is dead, when they’ve avenged their Captain, Fury shuts them down. Says that the Avengers Initiative is over. They’d been volatile from the start, dangerous, too hard to control. But it doesn’t matter anymore. The Avengers were over when Steve died, assembled again for only one last mission, and and when they walked away from the remains of a body that will never be found, their strings finally snap.

Tony doesn’t ask any of them to move out of the tower, but they all go anyway. It’s too empty without Steve, and now Tony spends most of his time shut up in the shop, trying to drown out the memories of Steve with pounding music, concentrating only on his work.

He doesn’t know where the others will go – Bruce, maybe back to Calcutta, or somewhere just as remote, where he can calm himself down again. It will be hard. Clint and Natasha might go together; not back to SHIELD, they can’t now, but somewhere else, far away from New York. Thor probably goes to Jane, or maybe even to Asgard, weighed down by the loss of both a brother and now, a friend.

And he doesn't mean to shut Pepper and Rhodey out, but Tony can't help it. Losing Coulson was bad enough. Coulson was a good agent, someone that Tony respected and even liked, but they were by no means close. And he came back. Losing Steve is another thing altogether. Steve was his teammate, his friend, his Captain, and nothing will ever compare to losing him.

Tony wonders whether it would have been like this had it been one of the others. If it had been Bruce, or Natasha, or Tony himself. And it would have been terrible, too awful to think about, but maybe it wouldn't have torn them apart like losing Steve did.

There's a big funeral. All the reporters are there, and millions of people across the country watch it on television. Tony hates it. Steve was never one for all of this - sure, he used to do all those shows during the war, and was in those bad movies, but that was all propaganda. Just another part of the war effort, and Steve was good enough at it - handsome and charming and wholesome, but it's never what Steve was really meant for.

He was always a soldier at heart, someone who wanted to protect people. The public sees Captain America, but they’re mourning the loss of an idol, a symbol. Not a man. Tony had made that mistake, at first, but he realized soon enough that the person his father had always talked about wasn’t just Captain America. He was Steve Rogers, and that’s the person that Tony knew.

The others all turn up for the funeral, but their strings are hanging by the thinnest of threads, not strong enough now to hold them together. There’s still a gaping hole where Steve should be, one that’s never going to close up.


End file.
